Chickens on the Farm

[imafan26]

This is great! I am learning a lot about chickens and a few terms I never heard before. My uncle always bought chicks from the hatchery and they were supposed to be sexed and all female. But sometimes there would be a rooster in the bunch.

[sweetiepie]

This is great! I am learning a lot about chickens and a few terms I never heard before. My uncle always bought chicks from the hatchery and they were supposed to be sexed and all female. But sometimes there would be a rooster in the bunch.

You can sex chicks by looking at their wings right when they are born. If you wait to long, it becomes hard to tell as the feathers grow in. Girls have longer feathers on their wings and develop quicker feathers there and boys have short or no feathers yet, usually.

So far we have 10 chicks and 10 pips, also I believe two didn't make it for some reason, one pipped and quit and one zipped but didn't finish coming out, and no movement for hours. That is always sad, I will have to see after hatching what maybe happened to them. I usually wait 24 hours after the first one hatched to take out any chicks. Most have usually hatched that are going to hatch by then. I wait so I don't interrupt the humidity to much.

Chicks can go 3 days with out eating and drinking after they are born. They continue to live off the egg yolk, that's how they can ship them by the post office with no worries.

[applestar]

I'm really enjoying watching the eggs develop -- (we need more cute chick pictures! )

Thanks so much for taking pictures and sharing all this.

[sweetiepie]

This is what I woke up to this morning.

We had 21 chicks that hatched and two that were pipped. I removed 20 of the chicks, (left one that had just hatched so he could dry more and get fluffy.) I removed the old egg shells also and the two eggs that didn't hatch and had died. Hurried and closed it back up.

To the brooder, we go.

So I am hesitant to show pictures of inside my chicken coop, because I don't dust, I don't like to dust in the house but I do. But I draw the line at dusting barns, etc. So my pictures are not going to be of beautiful areas because this grainery is about 100 years old and animals are dirty. I am not sure how people can show these perfect places because I have more to do and I am not one to worry about what the Jone's have or are doing. I believe in if it works, that's good enough.

So on with the show. This is the room in the grainery where the chicks go. Now I have two area's set up, one for the chicks I am hatching and one for the ones I expect to get in the mail next Monday. I don't want to mix them up because the ones in the mail are prue breeds and are going to be my laying hens, next year.

Here they are in there new area.

This is how I set up there brooder area. I use cardboard to keep any draft from affecting them and also keep them from wandering away from the light. As you can see my cardboard is a little used. I flipped it over when we had a waterer keep over flowing a couple years ago and messed up the bottom. See I am frugal to the very end.

I then put hay down on the floor, some people use wood shaving but the chicks can eat that. Hay, if they eat it, won't hurt them. I then put newspaper down on top of the hay, only for the first few days of life. This helps keep them from filling up on the hay and I also sprinkle food on the paper because they will peck at the ground at this stage but might not find the food dish, right away because they are sleepy after being born.

I use chick starter (food) for the first two weeks of life. I use an egg carton for there feeder, usually one that is wrecked to use for storing eggs. I sprinkle baby chick grit on top of the food. Usually the grit is made of fine granite, or rock.

As I have mentioned before, in the past I have tried small waterers meant for chicks and have had nothing but problems. So I use a large waterer that you fill from the top and has a float. I like the fill from the top because I don't have to take it out, and I can just add more as needed but don't have to fill it full, encase it should leak. Many other waterers you have to tip upside down and unscrew the base to fill. This is a pain when you have the lip filled with rocks. I use rocks along the lip of the waterer to keep them from drowning. I put electrolyte, and probiotics in their water, along with a dash of sugar for pep. I only do this when they are first hatched.

Some close ups.

[applestar]

Soooo cute! I showed the photos to my kids

It seems like they are progressing as you expected? It must be pretty noisy in the granary now.

I applaud your thriftiness. I think people throw things out way too casually.

[sweetiepie]

It seems like they are progressing as you expected? .

Yes, I am happy with this hatch. Another 6 hatched so that is a total of 27 that hatched out of 37 that went into Lockdown. I did have one yesterday in the brooder die. That happens occasionally, not often, sometimes things don't develop right.

I locked incubator 2 down today. They are due to hatch on Thursday.

Incubator 3 is having temperature fluctuations, I do not like that incubator. A fan makes a huge difference. So I won't be using that incubator again. So anything that hatches from that will be a surprise.

So I think I will be short of my 80, so I am collecting eggs for the next go around.

They are very cute at this stage, I will keep posting pictures as they grow. They start to get ugly as their feathers come in.

[sweetiepie]

Incubator 1 is done, no more pips or hatches. I cleaned that out today. I have about half the eggs I need to fill it again.

Incubator 2 has four pips this morning. Again I this is a little early. Though Incubator 1 mostly hatched on the right day. A couple early and a few late. So I think I will stick with that temp.

I had another chick pass away yesterday, cause unknown, though I had noticed him being more sleepy than the rest of the chicks. For me it is uncommon to lose chicks but I hear it is pretty common for others. The only time I lost a few chicks was when I tried a strictly meat bird like the Red Ranger or Cornish Rocks. I don't get those anymore because I didn't like the loss or leg issues they have. I like to see things alive and healthy.

[sweetiepie]

Incubator 2 has seven hatched chicks and 17 pips. So they are looking good.

[sweetiepie]

So I haven't posted on here for a while because incubator 2 has made me sick to my stomach. But this is a learning curve.
So far only 10 are still alive, 20 hatched. Most of the chicks hatched with their yolk not absorbed. It is gross, you can google if you want but I was not up to taking photos.

Moving on. I learned one degree to 100 per my thermometer is too hot and it pushed them to hatch to early before they were ready. Though I did more research and most sites claim it is to high of humidity but the humidity was the same as incubator 1 so I am not buying it.

Incubator 3 is in lockdown and tomorrow is day 21 but no pips. Without a fan, and having temperature issues with this incubator, I will be surprised if any hatch. But fingers crossed.

Tomorrow morning, I am hoping that all the chicks I ordered are at the post office, the last I looked the order got split up and the chicks were in two different towns.

I have started another incubator because I am about 18 short of my goal. Collecting eggs for the other incubator and I am not loading the one with no fan again. If I wasn't such a hoarder I would throw it away.

So I liked the hatch from incubator 1, temp at 99 but after the research I did about the yolk not absorbing I might try lock down humidity at 60 to 70 percent instead of 75.

[sweetiepie]

The chicks that came in the mail, look good. Two of the leghorns look a little sluggish but no deaths on their trip. That is always great to see.

White leghorns

Here is the free Exotic. My quess is he is a Golden Lace Wyndonette but I could be wrong.

Rhode Island Reds, 3 Easter Eggers, 1 white Wyndonette, 1 silver laced wyndonette and another free exotic chick.

[sweetiepie]

These are the chicks I got in the mail.

These are the ones that hatched.

Sorry I have not kept up with the pictures. They have really grown and moved last week into a coop because I had more chicks hatch and needed to make room in the brooder. I ended up with 98 chicks total from the 3 hatchings.

[applestar]

Wow I missed the mailed chick pictures too!? I guess I've been overwhelmed with planting and garden prep. Amazing how quickly they grow. I don't blame you that it's hard to keep taking pictures.

...that's a LOT of little cheepers! There is a song sparrow's nest on my neighbors side of the fence in a shrubbery and the babies in the nest make so much noise all day long, but I doubt there are more than a handful in there.... ...pretty soon the eggs in the robin's nest in the gate arbor right outside my bedroom window will hatch -- THEN I will be hearing THEM all day, too....

[sweetiepie]

Oh, they are at that curious, what treat do you have for me stage. All awkward teenager with there feathers coming in like pimples. I needed some new layers too, and some new roosters to mix in.

[sweetiepie]

Here is the update on the chicks. They have all their feathers in and go outside without being a big chicken about it. Switched food to half chick starter and half cracked wheat.

[sweetiepie]

Marlingardener, Yes those are Rhode Island Reds and Leghorns, and three Easter Eggers in the last picture. My cows like to lay by the runs and watch the chickens go by. I have about 200 chickens now. Are yours Australorps? Do you lock them up at night? Probably from the inside. I had thought about putting a top on the runs but am not sure how that would work when snow built up on it, so we leave it open and lock them up each night.

Getting excited to have them start laying. Right now I have year old hens that are only laying a dozen a day out of 40. It is my fault, I incubated eggs last year, crossing more for heavier chickens for butchering and then kept whatever hens were left over and they are the broodiest things. Plug up the nesting boxes and they end up in solitary confinement until they come out of it. Plus they go through more food to keep up there sexy figures.

[sweetiepie]

Some of my mut's are Australorp crosses and they are the loudest and most offended when they can't be broody. I thought it would be cute to have mama's and chicks but other chickens tend to be mean to them and they happen at different stages, so the chicks are different ages and I found I had chickens in almost every building to keep them separate and it was ridiculous. So back to the Rhode Islands and thought I would try the leghorns but like you I am not sure how the Leghorns are going to do this winter. Smaller and big combs, might lead to frozen dinners.

Do you have a rooster? I am keeping a Rhode Island and a White Wyndonette for chick incubating next year.

[sweetiepie]

Here is the free exotic chick. He is still trying to get in his real feathers. He has no tail feathers yet. He is starting to look sinister and his name is Abominable after the snow monster on Rudolph.

A leghorn, they are very flighty and aggressive to the other chickens. The were picking on a Easter Egger and I had to remove her. So I am trying to decide if I want to keep them over winter. I like my chickens to be more docile but not broody either.

[sweetiepie]

Also new to the chicken coop grainery is some new rodent killers.

This is Pumpkin, she came from Minnesota. She is worried about the dog.

This is Honey, I couldn't get a very good picture of her, she likes my lap. She is also from Minnesota. She is not worried about the dog.

This is Cee Cee and she thinks she is Queen. She too is keeping an eye on the dog.

This is the vicious dog peaking through the cat door. He doesn't bark, just whines, he is sure the kittens needed to be licked and drooled on.

This my mama cat's kittens she had in May. The kitten is in the barn and she too is worried about the dog, licking her. She has two brothers that are both grey and look the same. They are called Pete and Repete.

[GardeningCook]

How old do you let your kitties get before they go in for shots & spay/neuters?

[sweetiepie]

Some people will spay or neuter at about 8 weeks.

[ElizabethB]

I am jealous. I would love to raise my own chickens.

We have a friend who gives use eggs from his free range chickens. The BEST eggs ever!

I love the Kitties. They are soooo cute!

8 weeks is too early to spay/neuter. Cats are best spayed or neutered at 4 months.

Shop around. Spaying or neutering can be very expensive. In Lafayette there is a non-profit organization called Spay Nation. The cost is less than half what you would pay at a Vet's office.

BTW - I am a life time humble servant to cats. I am currently owned by 2 lovely girls. Sallie Sue is 4 and Daisy Faye is 3. Love my Girls.

[applestar]

Soooo cuuute!

[sweetiepie]

I have no real idea about spay/neutering. We tend to have hawks, bald eagles, coyotes, foxes, raccoons etc. that keep our cat population down unfortunately.

[GardeningCook]

Wow. That's sort of sad for the cats. We also have a lot of cat predators around here - fox, hawks, owls, & coyotes mostly. But my current three (down from ten a number of years ago) are an indoor-only gang, so no worries here. It is an unfortunate fact that outdoor/barn cats tend to have short lives. In fact, according to all of my veterinarians over the years, living an outdoor (or indoor/outdoor) life is the #1 reason for feline deaths.

[applestar]

@sweetiepie I hope you won't mind me continuing on a bit about barn cats because I wanted to tell this story before and refrained as OT but conversation is hovering on what I was going to share....

Our current kitties are originally barn kittens from a horse stable where we used to lease a horse. The owner told us about the kittens being born and how she's restricting access to a stall until kittens are ready to socialize, and when she did. All these kittens tumbled out of the barn!

They had obviously been trained by their moms (there were two mama cats) to hide when warned/shadows glided overhead. Turkey vultures, Eagles, Hawks, airplanes, a stray cloud covering the sun -- The little fur balls all dove under the tack shed, horse trailer, into the barn.

When we brought our adopted two home at 8-10 weeks, they freaked out in the bedroom when the ceiling fan was turned on, and dove into their crates and would NOT come out.

[sweetiepie]

Applestar, that is too funny.

[GardeningCook]

, but the ferals just carry too many diseases.

Which is why they really need to be spayed/neutered & vaccinated. Otherwise they just increase the feral problem. Sorry - but I'm an active proponent of both spay/neutering & vaccinating of cats - both pets & ferals. And for excellent reasons. Can give fabulous/horrible stories why this is a GOOD THING.

[applestar]

I'm really sorry -- let's move the cat-talk to another thread.

[MichaelC]

Hi applestar - Sorry for one more off topic post. I don't know your particular forum software or your forum moderation conventions, so forgive me if I'm out of line. But since the cat discussion began with the pictures, and all posts following have been on the cats, it shouldn't be too hard to split that out into its own thread.

[sweetiepie]

I am sorry many of you seen to have such a hard time with the farm life. I get the hint. I am slow at times but this is just a gardening place, so I will quit with the animals. We all have purposes, life cycles and joy to spread in our short or long life times, including animals. I love my animals and they were given to me with a purpose. Without the purpose, they would not exist and I would not get to enjoy them.

I will stick to gardening from now on.

[GardeningCook]

Good idea, because I'm already biting my tongue.

[GardeningCook]

Lovely Longhorns!! We have a fair number of Longhorn breeders/owners around here. I love watching them.

[Stefano]

Unfortunaly I don't have cows, but I have chickens, rabbits, some pheasants, a couple of peacocks and also two cats and one dog

[Stefano]

Yes! the peacocks are very noisy animals, expecially the male during the mating season in spring. You can hear it from one kilometer of distance and pereaphs than more